I think the Chryler bailout was in essence a private version of the WPA and the company is doomed. GM's bailout is looking like a huge succuss story. I heard they are more profitable than Toyota this year. I have a necro thread ready to recall when they pay all the money back

Let's see GM pay back all the government loans first before we call it a success.

The true success story here is Ford.

I mostly agree. The thing is everyone working for GM today would be unemployed if not for the bailout. If the bar for success is what benefits we the people the bailout is looking like when all is said and done it will of been a huge success. I do agree the final verdict is 3 or 4 years out when the federal goverment is fully divested and is either even or in the black.

I think Chrysler is a lost cause unless they have a drastic culture change. Quality issues are a result of a poisoned well from middle management/engineering/ to the shop floor. The culture of the company is broken, there design and manufacturing processes are archaic as evidenced by the failure rate. It is a huge challenge in a manufacturing enviroment to change a culture that tolerates QA escapes at the level Chrysler experiences. 25 years ago if I had one tool failure in 20 or one bad part in 20 I wouldn't of blinked. Now, a bad tool or a tool returned in a failed state means everything stops till the root cause of the failure is found and addresed. Manufacturing at Chrysler is probably exciting but, in manufacturing if it isn't boring it isn't in control and the company is bleeding money.

The 9.5 billion they supposedly paid back was just kiting from one gov't credit line to another. The loss carryovers are worth $45 Billion in tax revenues that won't be collected, so the taxpayer is the loser on that one too.

The IPO? we'll see. They've already scaled it way back, and they are searching for Mid East and Asian investors to prop up the share price.

A new $500 million plant in Mexico to build V8 engines (gas guzzlers, Obama?), and $14/hour jobs for the guys building Volt batteries using a technology that will be obsolete in 10 years at the outside.

"We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008

The successful IPO means the U.S. government's stake will immediately drop to 33 percent. It could fall further if certain warrants are exercised in the coming years.

"You're not in GM for a three-month investment," said Tim Leuliette, a director at Visteon Corp and longtime U.S. auto industry executive, speaking at the Reuters Autos Summit.

"You're into GM because a critical element, a critical building block of the U.S. economy, has significantly repositioned itself to be competitive."

The stock sale represents a step toward taxpayers recouping a $50 billion U.S. government rescue of the 102-year-old company, which had fallen from blue-chip status to bailout basket case in recent years.

The Obama administration's GM restructuring angered many and critics started referring to it as "Government Motors."

GM earned $5 billion in the first nine months of 2010 and is on track for its first full-year profit since 2004.

The automaker has cautioned that fourth-quarter profit will be slimmer because of vehicle launch costs and a higher proportion of less-profitable small cars in its mix of production. GM's European unit also remains unprofitable.

In a road show for investors spearheaded by GM Chief Executive Dan Akerson and Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell, the automaker has emphasized both its sharply lower costs and its exposure to key growth markets like China.

One of the open questions remains whether GM's China partner, state-owned SAIC Motor Corp Ltd, will participate in the IPO and how much it will invest.

The two companies have negotiated new cooperation in areas such as electric car programs in talks that began this summer. Under a tentative deal, SAIC had agreed to invest between $500 million and $1 billion in GM pending Chinese government approval, people with knowledge of those discussions said.

But two people familiar with the matter said that as of early Wednesday, China's Ministry of Commerce had not approved the SAIC investment.

Sources previously told Reuters that sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East and Asia separately had committed a combined $2 billion to GM's IPO.

Treasury will remain GM's largest shareholder after the IPO. U.S. officials have said it is likely to take until the next presidential term for the U.S. government to sell off all of its holdings in GM.

If the IPO prices at $33 per share, the U.S. government will need to see the stock rise by 47 percent to just above $48.50 to break even on its follow-on stock sales over the next several years.

At that level, GM would have a market value of more than $90 billion. By comparison, its closest rival, Ford Motor Co , has a market capitalization of $59 billion after a rally that has sent its stock up 65 percent this year.

Obama administration officials have argued that it would represent a kind of success if the White House breaks even only on the $30 billion that it committed to GM. Just over $19 billion in funding came from the Bush administration.

The GM bailout spared the automaker from liquidation and saved hundreds of thousands of manufacturing jobs at the company and its suppliers, officials have said.

Won't buy another GM or Chrysler vehicle until the gov't is completely out of the car business either.

It's gonna be another F-150 for me, after the first of the year so I can expense it in 2011.

"We will go through our federal budget – page by page, line by line – eliminating those programs we don’t need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way." -President Barack Obama 11/25/2008

I got a used Ford Focus this year, an '07, it is a good car. I had driven Fords for about 20 yrs when a string of bad ones made me switch to Plymouth in 2000. I'm glad I went back now, after a little trouble with the dealer it has cleared up nicely, and the Ford meets expectations (once again). When I can afford it, if I live that long, I'll get another Mustang, to replace my long lost 71 Mach 1, maybe a 2010 GT.

"If your plan is for one year, plant rice. If your plan is for ten years, plant trees.
If your plan is for one hundred years, educate children."

I will withhold judgement until GM can prove it can :
1) Maintain profitability over the long haul= and pay back ALL the money.
2) Build and continue building better vehicles. Not looking for anything fancy, just something people can drive and not have to be towed into the shop every other month, and after putting 100K on it the vehicle would not be falling apart.